Quick Hit LogoThe ghost of spending past crossed the promise of spending futurity with the publication of Education Calendar week's Quality Counts 2022 and the release of Gov. Dark-brown's proposed state budget on the same day last week.

In Ed Week'due south almanac comprehensive comparison of states on many measures, California stumbled to the bottom in per pupil spending in 2010-xi, the near contempo data. It was lth out of the states and Washington, D.C., with simply Utah behind it.

Only 2010-11 was the worst twelvemonth for California schools post-obit the Bang-up Recession. Information technology was as well the year earlier voters passed Suggestion 30, the Nov 2022 measure that temporarily raised land taxes well-nigh $6 billion per twelvemonth, with most of that going to K-12 schools and customs colleges.

School district finances take been looking upward since. Last calendar week, Brown proposed sharply boosting per pupil spending past eight.six per centum – $725 per student – for 2014-15.

EdWeek's and Brown'due south per pupil spending figures don't make for an apple tree-to-apple tree comparison, since EdWeek factors in cost of living, based on 2005 data of states' wages and salaries (also outdated but the latest federal data that EdWeek tin can go, it says). California is a relatively loftier-cost state, lowering its land ranking. That's also why advocates for higher spending in California prefer to cite the Quality Counts surveys, which take ranked California from 45th to now 50th over the past decade. By comparing, the National Pedagogy Association, using unadjusted information, ranked California 43rd in spending in 2010-11 simply in the 30s in other years.

Co-ordinate to Quality Counts, average per student spending in California was $viii,341 in 2010-11 – $3,523 below the boilerplate spending nationwide of $11,864.

According to the NEA, per student spending in California (page 85) was $8,689 in 2010-11 – $2,137 below the national average of $ten,826. It then jumped to 34th in 2011-12, spending $9,541 per pupil or $1,435 below the national average of $10,976, so falling to 38th in 2012-13.

Among California districts, however, per pupil spending has varied essentially. Funding in some  "basic assist" districts – the roughly 10 percent of districts with enough belongings wealth to finance schools outside of state funding – has exceeded the average past $3,000 or more per student. And, under the old system of funding "categorical grants," some districts received hundreds of dollars actress in funding per educatee. Under the new Local Command Funding Formula, districts with large percentages of low-income students and English learners will receive more the boilerplate state funding.

Quality Counts reported that in 2010-11, California was among the bottom states in another measure: the capacity to spend on education, which it defines as local and state revenues spent as a percentage of taxable resources. California spent 3.ane percent, tied with Oklahoma for 37th lowest.

Chocolate-brown's proposed eight.five percent per pupil increment applies to funding through Proposition 98, the primary formula for determining money for schools, but doesn't include some other sources of state and local revenue. But it's rubber to say that the actress money volition push button California upwardly from the bottom, though 2014-fifteen spending, if adopted by the Legiislature would notwithstanding be shy of the national average, past any measure.

Check out EdSource's state-past-country comparison of education spending for more information.

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